While reading the latest saga of our local health centre I wondered why everyone that pays local taxes hasn’t gone ballistic.
It would seem that Arrowsmith submitted the best bang for the buck, yet the Lark Group got the nod.
When you look at Trillium with its’ medical staff on call and Stanford Place, built and run by Larkin, there are some glaring differences. If you are a patient at Trillium and you have a medical problem, doctors are on call and can deal with things internally.
At Stanford Place you get a ride to the NRGH emergency and when kicked out you get your own ride home. You must remember these are fragile seniors that might have problems dealing with such mistreatment if they do not have family support. My understanding is this is being done because of lack of communications prior to the construction of Stanford Place with available medical personnel in Parksville.
Now let me see if I have this right, a private company decides not to see if the proposed facility being built for seniors could have medical staff available, should they be needed for emergencies. Yet they are permitted to take in assisted living seniors, and others that must be cared for by staff, without ensuring that the patients would get medical attention on site should it be required. This obviously is approved by VIHA. The solution is to ambulance them to the Emergency at Nanaimo that is already overloaded.
The twist I especially like is then the Larkin Group gets the go ahead for a health centre in Parksville. Arrowsmith loses out with an apparent sound strategy and Larkin gets the go ahead to build a public-private partner facility that might have private offices inside the building.
We don’t need another health centre, we need an emergency centre that would meet local needs and stop this insane busing to Nanaimo. It appears staffing and equipment would be forthcoming at no extra cost. My question is this: How can anyone justify continuing with the Larkin Plan?
That is the question that our MLA had better have a good answer for as he is the man that is supposed to take care of his riding’s best interest. I suggest everyone ask him why we are proceeding with this half baked idea.
Bob Tritschler
Parksville